Escambia County’s game against the No. 1 Thomasville Tigers was full of fireworks, including big plays and controversial calls Friday night at Herbert Barnes Stadium.

The Blue Devils (3-3, 2-2) fell behind early and could never recover as the Tigers rolled to a 38-15 win.

With the loss, the Blue Devils were faced with the reality that they left several big plays on the field.

Making plays on offense and defense is the key to competing in big games like this, Escambia County head football coach Mark Heaton said.

“We just need to make the plays that we have opportunites to make if we want to compete in a game like this,” he said. “We let them stay on the field for a couple for a third downs and fake punt.”

Things started sour for the Blue Devils as the Tigers drove down the field in three plays, but the Blue Devils defense tighened up and forced the Class 4A No. 1 into a field goal situation.

Controversy came with the field goal try as the Tigers’ kick appeared to sail wide left of the upright, but was called good by the officials to give Thomasville a 3-0 lead.

The controversial call was one that the Blue Devils would have to learn to live with, Heaton said.

“It does effect a team a little bit, but things like that are going to happen,” he said. “Those guys made a judgement call and we are going to live with that call. We just have to learn through things like that because they happen.”

Following that score, it was all Thomasville as they scored 28 more points in the first half to go into halftime, leading 31-0.

Following halftime, the Blue Devils came out looking to speed things up with the two-minute offense that was successful in the win over Faith Academy last week.

Speeding things up worked as on their second series they drove down the field in two plays. The big play came on a 41-yard pass from Chris Johnson to Derrick Williams, but the score came on a three-yard run by Johnson to put the score at 31-7.

The use of the quick offense was something Heaton said he sees as beneficial to his team.

“We knew we were going to try and pressure them early,” he said. “We’ve been speeding things up, and we think we are going to have to do that as the season progresses.”

The Tigers used their offense to put their lead back to 31  points on a big pass play.

The Blue Devils then put one more score on the board as Johnson put another touchdown on the board with a 38-yard scramble to pay dirt. With the two-point conversion the score would go to 38-15 where it would stay.

Next week, the Blue Devils travel to Saraland to take on the Spartans.

Before next week, the Blue Devils need to heal up, Heaton said.

“We need to get well again,” he said. “We have guys limping around and ap ossible concussion. We need to get well and have a good week of execution.”

The Blue Devils and Spartans kick off at 7 p.m. next Friday night in Saraland.